Yeah, as I guessed, he would fix it, heres his PM message:
-------
We have just made an important change to the Jamble rules. Effective immediately, the bonus for using all 7 letters on your rack will be changed to 5 points, down from 40 points previously.
The reason we made this change is because using all 7 letters in a turn-based Jamble format is easier than in a live Scrabble game, through the use of computer anagram programs. The change in bonus is to reflect the ease of doing this.
We are often asked, why not forbid the use of computer assistance? The answer is that it's impossible to prevent this from happening. Our official policy has always been that we do not encourage the use of computer programs, but we also do not consider it a violation of the rules simply because there's no way for us to detect that someone is using a computer program.
Here's an example: my wife has a PhD in English. When we play Scrabble in the kitchen, I know she's not using a computer program because we are sitting at the table across from each other, and yet she can pull out crazy words that I've never heard of. There's no way for us to tell the difference between someone who knows a lot of words and someone using a computer program. Just because they're using an obscure word doesn't mean that they're "cheating".
We also cannot prevent someone from using a printed dictionary. Is this considered "cheating"? And yet someone who is skilled at using a dictionary can also come up with some good words.
Lastly, the easiest method is one that's built into our system and cannot be changed. Someone can simply enter many letter combinations, and the Jamble program tells them whether the word is legal or not. Again, this cannot be considered "cheating".
The problem from our end is, there is no way for us to determine whether someone is playing "pure" or "with assistance". So we have to allow all methods.
Having said this, it's clear to us that it's easier to make 7-letter words in Jamble than in Scrabble. This is why we are lowering the bonus, to reflect the difference in the two games.
Since we are imposing the rule on everyone at the same time, theoretically no one has an advantage. If you have been saving for a 7-letter word, then yes, this will hurt you temporarily, but only for the next few moves. Please take this rule change into account as you plan the rest of your game.
We apologize for the inconvenience.
